The Dealmaster presents fine chairs for your sitting pleasure

Good Monday morning to you all, Arsians! Black Friday is approaching, and there is a tremendous amount of shopping to be done between now and the end of the year! Indeed, if you're anything like The Dealmaster himself, you'll be doing a great deal of that shopping from your computer, chasing deals down the dark corridors of the Internet. It's important to have a computer throne worthy of your efforts—a chair that will support your bottom in style and with a minimum of discomfort.

To that end, our friends at LogicBuy have located a pair of sweet deals on two Herman Miller chairs—the classic Aeron, staple of the dot-com days, and the new and extremely fancy Embody. Nothing can stop you when you're seated on one of these powerhouses!

In addition to the finest chairs your bottom shall ever see, we also have a nice spread of hardware of various shapes and sizes. As we close in on the holidays, we'll be ratcheting up the deals, so keep an eye out!

Lee Hutchinson
Lee is the Senior Technology Editor at Ars and oversees gadget, automotive, IT, and culture content. He also knows stuff about enterprise storage, security, and manned space flight. Lee is based in Houston, TX. Emaillee.hutchinson@arstechnica.com//Twitter@Lee_Ars

Just an observation: the Blu-Ray player is pretty much the same price at Sears so if you were getting both (because you're lazy and buying what's put in front of you right now) just get one package of TV and Blu-Ray player at the same time.

We have a ton of these at the office - definitely one of the most comfortable chairs I've ever sat in. When it came time to upgrade my chair at home, I decided I needed one of these. The price put the brakes on that real quick (this was when you could find these chairs going for $800+ brand new, a few years ago). Fortunately I found a used Aeron on Craigslist with a tear in the seat panel for only $150 - was able to fix the seat panel with a seat panel from a broken chair at the office. Good-as-new Aeron for $150 - hard to beat!

With that said, even at $530 I think this chair is worth it. Consider how much time you spend sitting down in front of your PC - at the office or at home, and then consider if your comfort is worth the price. The amount of adjustments you can make, the comfort, the material and quality, it's all worth it.

I have to second all the positive comments on the Aeron chairs. I have had one since 2001, and it is still in absolutely PERFECT condition. It is one of the BEST investments i have ever made. Even then though it was around $600 used.

Do yourself a favor: Get one.

...and yes, you need to spend more for arms. I recommend the adjustable arms.

I managed to buy my Herman Miller Mirra for £250 several years ago, with all the options (fabric cover, adjustable arms+pads, lumbar, full tilt), and brand new (still shrink wrapped and labelled) from an office furniture supplier. It was a spare from another customer's bulk office purchase which just came off the back of the lorry, so I was pretty lucky to snag this one at significant discount - albeit without any say in appearance (fortunately it was a tasty graphite grey colour).

Saying that, I do find the Aeron more comfortable - the smaller size seems better suited to my body, but the Mirra, when set up properly, is still pretty good. Plus the Aeron costs significantly more!

Btw. does any other owners find it difficult to clean off the dust build-up underneath the seat?

Ditto the bit.ly links - I wouldn't touch one of those with a thrity-nine-and-a-half-foot pole ('tis the season).

As for chairs, I certainly don't recommend buying cheap chairs - they're cheap for a reason - but I also can't justify spending a couple of car payments on a chair either. I spend 40 to 50 hours a week parked in a $300 high-back leather chair that I picked up on sale for $225 at Office Max almost 13 years ago, and it's still going strong.

While I'm sure that Aeron chairs are really nice, you can get really good chairs out there that are nearly as good (and still much better than 80% of chairs) in the $300+ range, which is half of the price of the Aerons. I used to sit in one and I personally prefer fabric cushion.

I'd love for Ars to do a little review on the best *affordable* chairs widely available. It seems like that would be something that the readership would be interested in. Even at $534 (sans arms), I suspect the Aeron is still far outside a lot of readers' ability to easily afford.

Do the Aeron chairs come assembled, or do they require assembly after removing the package?

Assembly is required in that you need to screw the back into the base. I think it took me about 5 minutes to assemble the one I got earlier this fall. If you spend time looking, you can find them new for ~$500 with the arms included and cheaper if you keep watching craigslist. My justification is that I've seen plenty of them that are 5+ years old in good condition under daily use where I've gone through $200 chairs in 2-3 years.

a good chair is well worth it if you sit in it all day. and it is much cheaper than the chiropractor or back doctor and better than back pain.naysayers remind me of people who clip newspaper coupons for lasik! really your eyes? come on!

I'd love for Ars to do a little review on the best *affordable* chairs widely available. It seems like that would be something that the readership would be interested in. Even at $534 (sans arms), I suspect the Aeron is still far outside a lot of readers' ability to easily afford.

That could be cool.

That said, I would be hesitant to pay even $300 for a chair without getting a chance to sit in it.

I don't like Aeron chairs, I find them to be very uncomfortable. Instead I've found my ergohuman chair to be well worth the money, so much so I sold the ergonomics folks at work on it, and there are now a significant quantity of them around.

I have to agree with other commentators that there seem to be price plateaus at which office chairs become significantly better. Up to~$300 seems to be the standard falls apart garbage you can buy at Staples and other office supply stores. From there up it seems you can get a quality chair if you shop around on the Internet. I think my Ergohuman was $499 when I got it, but was MSRPing for ~$900?

A good office chair (at home and work) will make your back significantly more happy with you.

Of course getting out of the chair more regularly and doing some physical activity would probably help too.

I don't like Aeron chairs, I find them to be very uncomfortable. Instead I've found my ergohuman chair to be well worth the money, so much so I sold the ergonomics folks at work on it, and there are now a significant quantity of them around.

I have to agree with other commentators that there seem to be price plateaus at which office chairs become significantly better. Up to~$300 seems to be the standard falls apart garbage you can buy at Staples and other office supply stores. From there up it seems you can get a quality chair if you shop around on the Internet. I think my Ergohuman was $499 when I got it, but was MSRPing for ~$900?

A good office chair (at home and work) will make your back significantly more happy with you.

Of course getting out of the chair more regularly and doing some physical activity would probably help too.

I have a customer that has an office full of them so I was able to try them out. For years I would replace my chair once or twice a year and I finally asked my customer what chairs they had. I was shocked by the price but it's been 2-3 years with them (I bought two) and they're great. I had to use the lifetime warranty once when the recliner lever broke (my fault). They sent the whole bottom half of the chair as a replacement.

FWIW, I spent about $1k for a Neutral Posture chair that lasted me 14 years, and it's still in great shape, though it's not my main chair anymore. I switched to a Humanscale Freedom in 2008 (which also cost about $1k) and I'm planning on keeping it for probably at least another ten years.

Spending a thousand dollars (or $800, or $750, or whatever) on a high-quality chair is a smart bet. You can get one that's comfortable and shaped for you, and they'll last you for a long, long time. Spending $100 every year or two on an Office Depot Special is just pissing your money away--not to mention what those garbage chairs do to your back.